Monday, January 23, 2012

well dang, it's been a wild weekend. football and walking in boston in chilling temperatures and music. at the current moment (12:13 AM EST 1/24/2012) here's how Confessions After Dark stands right now:

*Impulsive is getting close. Some tweaking here and there needs to be done to get to a certain level it needs to be.*Critical is DONE. it's perfect right now.*Same for The Wild and House of Illusions (Deception's Afoot)*Silencia is now Fatal Ambiance. Close to done as well.

*Sketching out the lyrics right now with timecodes so I know when to start, stop, break, change, everything. Details city chick, det-details city.

*Planning possible people to collab with for this. Maybe 1 or 2, but I'm feeling 1 collab will be appropriate.

Onto the other two EPs, which are part of a trilogy now (the Imperfect Trilogy):

*Revised Feels Like. Again.*Everything else remains static.

*Unplugged EP is being re-written to better suit the trilogy. Once it started as a story about a breakup, now it's the penultimate chapter of the story I'm trying to tell.

On the Nightmare front: *Project Nightmare 365 is under work right now.*Planning the next game-related Project Nightmare release. It may be Metroid (complete with Jazztroid 2: Return of The Groove Hunter) or it may be Zelda. Or it may be Sonic.

Finally the other projects:*SWEETDICULOUS has a huge project up-coming that ties into something else.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Genres are stupid: I remember starting out trying to play in the rules of hip-hop. Kept on doing that for years, then after so much of living in the same 16 bars-hook-16 bars-hook-16 bars-hook-end structure, it got boring. I got bored. And that's something that never should happen with music, you get bored with what you do. It's tragic.

Lower Your Expectations: When it comes to being famous, slap yourself if you think you'll be the next big thing. Instead, be realistic and you'll surprise yourself. It's always the ones who don't expect fame that get it in the end.

Please, get off your knees: If you're that desperate for fame, that you have to "assume the position" to get somewhere, it may be time to reassess a few things. Specifically, if you have pride to achieve your goals and not succumb to desperation.

Study Business: Great musicians also have great business sense. Not Gene Simmons style (sue-everyone-and-act-like-a-mizer) but a reasonable, in tune with the audience, sense. Don't give everything away, set a floor and stay with it.

Be Your Own Artist: You don't need to remix every hot single, appear on every mixtape, collab on everything. Stand on your own two.

Don't Fake It: Lana Del Rey is example of why you need to be great live and in the booth. Bad live shows can KILL your career. Ashlee Simpson....nuff said.

Respect: Make some friends, but do help them too, because surprise surprise...they may help you when you need it, only because you helped them first.

Be Original: Cookie-cutter musicians die out fast. Don't believe me, then look at any artist who came up doing the same style of the top act in '93, '99, '03, '06 and so on so forth. The original people last longer and while they will go unrecognized for years...they get the fame and adoration that lasts.

Monday, January 2, 2012

That was a fun, long, exhaustive process there. 3-4 months of work and it paid off with a great new Project Nightmare installment.

So yeah, with that done, it's time to look forward. Obviously, I'm considering Nightmare V and this time around, the gameplan is a 1 year development schedule. More elaborate, but not a reason for excess. We'll see how it goes.

Also, there's a good chance alternate versions of Nightmare IV arise. Good chance, but it may or may not happen. Here's hoping it does.

So now, we turn the attention to Confessions After Dark. The first of 3 in a trilogy, yes, we are doing an EP trilogy, because they all have a common thread that they all deviate from. One of them is aggressive, the other is brooding, the other is reflective. Take that to mean what you like. Impulsive will drop by mid-February, with the follow-up single 2 weeks later. And then...the full EP some time after.